


Friday Night at Sugar Shack

by MistressPandora



Category: Outlander & Related Fandoms, Outlander Series - Diana Gabaldon
Genre: Anal Sex, Explicit Sexual Content, Fluff, Lord John time travels, M/M, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Oral Sex, Rimming, coffee shop AU, terrible puns
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-14
Updated: 2020-06-14
Packaged: 2021-03-04 03:15:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,040
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24706690
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MistressPandora/pseuds/MistressPandora
Summary: Brian Randall's Friday night plans to ogle the cute guitar player are derailed when a gorgeous man dressed as a redcoat literally falls into his lap. The guy really is British and seems to think he's from 1765.
Relationships: Lord John Grey/Brianna Randall Fraser MacKenzie
Comments: 24
Kudos: 70
Collections: Bad Things Happen Bingo, Outlander Bingo Challenge





	Friday Night at Sugar Shack

**Author's Note:**

  * For [iihappydaysii](https://archiveofourown.org/users/iihappydaysii/gifts).



> Posted in celebration of Lord John Grey's 291st birthday.
> 
> Fills my Bad Things Happen Bingo square: **Bleeding through the Bandages**  
>  And my Outlander 2020 Bingo square: **Coffee Shop AU**
> 
> Dedicated to [iihappydaysii](https://iihappydaysii.tumblr.com/) who first gender swapped Brianna and introduced us to the most epic OTP to ever OTP.

As far as coffee went, the brew in Brian Randall’s cup was at least better than the all-night diner up the street where he and his friends stumbled into booths after late nights of studying or definitely _not_ studying. It cost more too. But the occasional forty-five cents was worth not getting a stomach ache from the military-grade sludge at the diner. Besides, the diner didn’t bring in local bands to cover The Beatles and the Monkees on Friday nights. And this Friday night, the guitar player was a guy named Jeremy, the dreamy grad student that Brian had had a crush on since he’d been the TA in Brian’s first early modern European history class last semester.

Brian was early for the gig, but Jeremy didn’t need to know that. Besides, it gave him the opportunity to snag the perfect table by the window, right next to the short platform that served as a stage. He’d have a great view of Jeremy, unobstructed by the amplifiers. It was also close enough that if he hopped off the platform, as he often did, it would be Brian’s table he perched on.

His wristwatch told him it had been exactly two minutes since he last looked at his wristwatch. Quarter till nine. The band would come in to set up in about half an hour. Brian sighed, took a sip of his coffee—with a metric ton of sugar but no cream so that it at least _looked_ black and worldly—and stared out the window. It was full dark now, though the sun was not long set as the spring days began to stretch into short summer nights.

Lightning flashed across what he could see of the Boston skyline and Brian squinted through the window. That was odd. There hadn’t been a cloud in the sky when he’d walked from his apartment to the coffee shop earlier. A flash of lightning again, but no thunder. Or was there? If there was, it was too distant to be distinct. Yet the window vibrated in its frame, a disconcerting buzz that had Brian sitting back in his chair, giving the pane a few extra inches to do...whatever the hell it was doing. Looking around the coffee house, the few patrons continued about their business, either not noticing or not caring that something freaky was happening.

Brian picked up his coffee and peered into the cup, his fingers tight on the handle. _How much sugar did she put in this? Oh my God, I’m having a stroke. I’m nineteen and I’m about to die from a sugar-induced stroke. Is that a thing?_

The next time lightning flashed, the window exploded, showering Brian in a hail of glittering glass shards and the electric smell of ozone. He threw one arm up to shield his face as something person-shaped and red crashed onto his table, his coffee mug smashing somewhere behind him. The red person-shaped thing flattened the table, riding the flat top of it to the floor. The wooden legs scattered in all directions with a shriek of wood on tile.

“Holy shit!” Brian squawked. He lowered his arm and stared at the destruction, the pile of shattered glass and splintered wood. A ridiculously flowy red coat wrapped around the motionless, man-shaped figure lying face-down inches from Brian’s feet. He looked out through the remains of the window into the street but there was no one who looked to have thrown the guy through the glass. Just a few gawking passers-by and the Friday evening noises of Boston, engines and car horns and the occasional shouting.

The figure groaned and stirred, startling Brian and sending him careening backward out of his chair onto the floor. He scrambled onto his knees, bracing himself against the seat of the tipped-over chair. “Hey, buddy, you okay?” Brian asked. “What happen—”

The figure—a man, definitely—rolled over onto his back and covered his face with his hands, pressing his palms into his eyes like he was trying to keep his swollen brain from falling out.

Now that he could see it from the front, Brian realized it wasn’t just a red coat. It was, quite specifically, a _redcoat_. As in the uniform of the British army in the eighteenth century. It was a superb replica too, totally authentic. Had there been a reenactment somewhere tonight that Brian hadn’t known about?

“Oh, bloody fucking hell,” the man said in a British accent far too sincere to be affected. He uncovered his face— _dear God, he’s gorgeous_ —and his eyes went wide with undisguised shock. The man sat up too fast and groaned again. His expression changed from shock to something like actual fear when he looked outside.

Brian made his way through the wreckage at a crawl, one arm held in front of him in what he hoped was a non-threatening gesture. “Seriously, man, are you alright?”

The man’s attention snapped to Brian, and he blinked at him, bemused. “Pardon my bluntness, but...who are you?”

Brian snorted. “Paul Revere. Have you got a name?”

“Lord John Grey,” the man said, his eyes darting around the mostly deserted coffee shop before settling back on Brian. “Your servant, sir.” The words were automatic, but something in his inflection was sincere. Lord John Grey couldn’t seem to focus on any one thing, turning his head this way and that, wincing. “I understand this may be a rather odd question, Mr. Revere, but would you mind telling me where we are?”

“No, my name isn’t—never mind. Do you mean Sugar Shack, the name of the coffee shop? Or… Boston?”

Grey’s eyes widened again and he looked at the traffic outside. “And...what are those?”

“Oh boy,” Brian muttered. This guy was nuts, which was all kinds of unfortunate. “Out of, call it morbid curiosity… what year do you think it is?”

“Seventeen hundred and sixty-five,” Grey said as if he knew he was wrong but had no idea what else to say.

Brian blinked. Of course, the simplest explanation here was that this Lord John Grey was a complete lunatic. But he didn’t _look_ like he was stark raving mad. Unnerved and trying to make sense of things, yes. Lucid and intelligent, also yes. But not crazy, which was perhaps more disturbing. “Add about two hundred years. It’s 1967.”

“Oh. Fucking Christ,” Lord John said, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Good Lord, she wasn’t bluffing.”

"Who wasn't bluffing? You know, that cut looks pretty nasty," Brian said, pointing to a gash on Lord John's temple. _Walk him to the hospital, Randall. Just walk the beautiful, insane man to the hospital. He's crazy, he has to be._ "Why don't you come with me and I'll help you get cleaned up. My apartment isn't far from here." _Dumb ass._

Grey stared at Brian for a long time, searching for something. Either he found it—or he didn’t—and nodded. “I appreciate your kind assistance, Mr. Revere.”

Brian brushed the broken glass from his pants as he stood up and offered his hand to Grey, laughing. “That was a joke, man. My name is Brian Randall.” Lord John took his hand and let Brian drag him to his feet. That simple touch sent sparks up Brian’s arm as electric as the mysterious lightning had been, and Brian found himself unwilling to let go.

“Ah,” Lord John said, staring at their clasped hands before dropping his.

 _Oh God, he felt it too,_ Brian thought. _No! Don’t do it, Randall. Don’t fall for the crazy guy with the dreamy face who thinks he’s from 1765. Your mother will murder you and make it look like an accident._

“I’m afraid I don’t understand the humor, but I’ll take your word that it was so.” Grey gingerly touched his cut temple and examined the blood on his fingertips, then stooped to pick up an actual tricorn hat. Because of course he had a tricorn hat. Why would that be weird?

So this was a thing that was happening and Brian couldn't help but grin. “Oh man, if you are crazy, you’re at least committed as hell. Come on.”

* * *

The apartment that Brian shared with his friend Lenny was a ten minute walk from Sugar Shack. It felt at least twice that walking with Lord John. He might not have attracted so much attention if he'd been _either_ bleeding from the face _or_ in that ridiculous uniform _or_ drop-dead gorgeous. But he was the trifecta of bizarre conspicuousness and yet the man had nodded politely, muttering “I beg your pardon,” or some other such nicety as they pushed through the Friday night downtown crowd.

Lenny was out when Brian unlocked the door, of course. On his seventh or eighth date with a girl who had asked him to borrow a pencil in a literature class or something. “Have a seat over there on the sofa,” Brian said, gesturing into the spartan living room. “The light’s better in there.”

Lord John removed his hat and furrowed his brows again in what was starting to be an adorable expression of confused wonder. Brian switched on the lamp nearest the sofa and Grey startled, blinking at the bright lampshade. Of course, they’d been surrounded by electric lights since Grey had crash-landed in Brian’s lap, but he hadn’t seen anyone actually turn one on or off. _Yep, committed to the crazy. Although..._

Grey lowered himself to the second-hand sofa and looked around the room with interest, an expression conveying a respect that didn’t exist in 1967.

“I’ll be right back with the first aid kit. Mom restocks it every month or two. Sit tight.” After a pause to kick off his shoes, Brian retreated to the kitchen and retrieved the tin box from the cabinet above the stove.

When he came back to the living room, Brian found Lord John squinting under the lampshade, reaching toward the naked bulb with an extended finger. He yanked his hand back with a gasp and stuck his finger in his mouth, which filled Brian’s head with all kinds of tantalizing mental images.

“Huh,” Brian said, shaking his head in disbelief. “If I didn’t know any better, I’d swear you actually were from 1765.”

“I don’t blame you for not believing me,” Grey said as Brian sank onto the sofa next to him with the first aid kit. “Were it not for the plethora of strange evidence everywhere I turn, I would not believe you either.”

Brian grinned as he unpacked gauze, tweezers, and rubbing alcohol from his kit. “Yeah, I guess that’s fair. Alright, let’s have a look at that gash.” They sat close enough that their knees touched, and Brian turned Grey’s face into the light with gentle fingers under his chin.

It might have been Brian’s imagination—he kind of hoped it wasn’t—but Lord John inhaled sharply through his nose at Brian’s touch. It wasn’t the startled gasp of someone who has just been touched without warning or invitation. It was almost the same way Brian had reacted the first time Jeremy had tutored him and put his hand on his shoulder, only... more.

Brian let it go for now, focusing instead on the first aid. Pouring out a bit of alcohol onto the gauze, he paused. “This might sting a bit.” He wiped Lord John’s face clean of blood, and examined the cut more closely. “Well, good news, I don’t see any glass in there and the bleeding has pretty much stopped already. Doesn’t look like you’ll need stitches.” The Band-aid wrapper crinkled in his hands, and as he smoothed the adhesive on Grey’s temple, he felt Lord John’s eyes boring into him. “It’s not polite to stare,” Brian muttered with a smile.

“I’m sorry,” Lord John said, rather breathless. “It’s just that… you remind me so very much of someone from… well, from my time.”

“Oh yeah?” Brian sat sideways on the sofa and rested one elbow on the back of it, propping his head on his hand. “That’s kind of weird. Who?”

“Call him a particular friend,” Grey said, staring at Brian now as if nothing else existed in the world. It made his stomach flip and flutter. “It’s uncanny.” Grey laughed, short and disbelieving. “You’re a spitting image of the man, only…”

Biting his lower lip, Brian took a risk and touched the back of Lord John’s hand, tentative at first, then laid his palm over Grey’s knuckles with as much confidence as he could muster. “Only what?” he whispered. Touching Grey’s hand felt like tumbling through time and space and left him a little dizzy.

“Only…” Lord John looked down at their hands, taking several desperate, shuddering breaths. “Only I have just realized I’ve been dreaming about you for all these years.” He flipped his hand over and tangled his fingers between Brian’s. “I thought it was merely a faulty memory of him from our first meeting when he wasn’t much older than you, but no.” Grey looked up into Brian’s eyes and the connection was an immediate and overwhelming punch to the gut and his head swam.

One or both of them had inched closer and there was no doubt about it, Brian Randall was about to kiss this crazy man with the impossible delusion that rang inexplicably true.

“It was you, Mr. Randall. All this time. How is it possible?”

Brian licked his lips, so close he could feel Lord John’s warm breath on his mouth. “Mr. Randall was my father,” he whispered. “Just call me Brian.”

“Alright then. Brian.”

It didn’t matter who closed the narrow gap. This wasn’t a _he_ kissed _Brian_ or _Brian_ kissed _him_ kind of a thing. They crashed together, the gradual approach yielding all at once to an urgent passion. It burnt Brian to the core, filling him with an undeniable need. He’d wanted this man before, but now that he was kissing him, _this_ was destiny. This was an irresistible ache. Brian pressed the advance and Lord John let him, yielded to him, to _them_ , all of it. _Oh God, yes, he feels it too!_ Brian braced one hand on Lord John’s thigh and Grey yanked himself backward with a shout of pain.

“Shit, what—what happened?” Brian asked, looking Grey up and down, searching frantically for the problem.

Lord John winced. “No, no, it’s quite alright.” He flipped back the wide skirt of his coat to reveal a three inch tear in his pants, soaked in blood.

“Oh my God,” Brian said, peeling apart the ripped fabric. “Is this from the window?”

“Actually, no,” Grey said, some of the color returning to his face. “The witch slashed me with a dagger before she sent me to you.”

“Take your pants off,” Brian said. The instruction was met with immobile silence and he looked up at Lord John who stared at him with that adorable furrowed brow expression. Brian pinched the fabric of Grey’s pants and wiggled it. "I'm actually not being fresh. That needs attention or it'll get infected." Brian smirked. "Once the minor medical emergency has been resolved, _then_ I'll be fresh. Deal? Lord John?"

Grey smiled for the first time since he'd crash landed. It was warm and soft and lit up his face so brightly that Brian thought he'd melt. "I realize I am the stranger here but you do say the oddest things. And please, call me John."

Brian snorted. "If you think I'm odd now, you ain't seen nothing yet. Now drop trou. Or I’ll take you to my mom, who has excellent bedside manner but will also scold you and ask a million really stressful questions.”

“Ah. Excellent point,” John said, bending to unbuckle his boots and pull them off. He stood and shucked his red coat, revealing...well, very little actually with his loose sleeves, waistcoat, and neckcloth obscuring most of his silhouette. Watching that coat come off though, and the graceful way John held himself through the simple task of laying it over the back of the couch had Brian’s imagination running away with him. John shucked his pants, revealing muscular, battle scarred legs that Brian was pretty sure could crush him. His long shirt maintained some semblance of his modesty, the front of it blood-stained from the gash in his thigh.

“Much better,” Brian said, flashing a grin he knew to be particularly impish, and John arched an eyebrow in reply as he sat back down. Brian cleaned John’s wound with a wad of gauze wet with alcohol. John hissed and tightened his hand on Brian’s shoulder, which translated to a phantom squeeze a bit lower. “So a witch, huh?”

“That’s right,” John said, voice a bit strained but steady. “At least, that’s what she claimed. I wasn’t inclined to believe such nonsense, of course. At the time, at least.”

“And here I was led to believe everyone in your time was really superstitious.” Brian would have preferred to talk about other things, like how to get John out of the rest of his clothes and into Brian’s bed. But Brian did need to focus on his task and John needed to do the opposite.

“Oh, they are,” John answered. “Well, not everyone, of course. But as a general rule, you’re not wrong.”

This close, John smelled like leather and black powder and sweat, and Brian found it intoxicating. “So, some lady you thought was nuts stabbed you in the leg and then sent you two hundred years into the future to crash through a window directly in front of me. Sounds like shenanigans to me.”

“I’m not sure what _shenanigans_ are, but I do seem to find myself in the most unexpected, ridiculous, and frankly outlandish situations.”

Brian chuckled. “That would be shenanigans alright.” He slathered Neosporin over the gash and dressed it with gauze held in place with a few strips of medical tape. Tossing everything back into his first aid kit, he grinned at John. “There, good as new.”

“Thank you, Brian. For your kindness. I believe that concludes the minor medical emergency,” John said with a smirk.

“Are you making fun of me?”

“Not at all,” John assured him. “I was merely hoping to understand what you meant by—how did you put it? ‘Being fresh’ with me?”

“Oh, well, that would look something like this.” Brian surged forward and brought their mouths crashing together again, and John kissed him back without missing a beat. One of them made a little noise of pleasure. Maybe both of them. Brian braced his hand against John’s uninjured and still very bare thigh. God, it felt like he’d been kissing this man for eons and they could keep kissing until all the stars died. It was new and familiar and beautiful and heartbreaking all at once.

John pushed away from Brian a fraction of an inch, still close enough that his breath tickled Brian’s lips. “Forgive me if this sounds absurd, though absurd seems to be the going state of things this evening, but… do you believe in destiny? Or perhaps love at first sight?”

“I’m starting to,” Brian whispered and kissed John again. “Were you being literal? When you said you’d been dreaming about me?”

“I was.” John fisted Brian’s shirt, holding onto him. “Brian, this is absolute madness. It’s impossible. What is the rational explanation?”

Brian tightened his grip on John’s leg, felt the bridled strength underneath his hand. “Does it have to be rational?” He couldn’t get over how John’s lips could taste so familiar and very strange all at once. John’s tongue in Brian’s mouth drove away all reason. “I think one or both of us has lost every last one of his marbles, but I don’t care,” Brian said. “Do you?”

“Not in the slightest.” With a shove, John had Brian pinned against the back of the couch and straddled his lap. His fingers tangled in Brian’s hair, his mouth hot and insistent and _dear God_ , so talented. Brian was so distracted that he didn’t realize John had unbuttoned Brian’s shirt until he felt the man’s warm hand against his skin. He sucked in a gasp through his nose, and John froze. “Are you alright, Brian? Too much?”

Brian dug his fingers into John’s back, holding him in place in case he decided to back off too much. “No! I mean yes. Not—shit.” Brian stopped, closed his eyes and fought to get his brain into gear. There was _clearly_ a blood flow issue making him so incoherent. “Yes, I am very alright. No, it is not too much.” He opened his eyes again and stared up at John, whose gaze was steady and infinite, the most wonderful place he’d ever been. “Would you fuck me, John?”

It was John’s turn to close his eyes and he made a noise somewhere between a whine and a moan. “Oh Christ,” he gasped. “I dreamed you would say that, exactly like that.”

“And did you? In your dream?”

“Sometimes,” John admitted. He was hard, his cock jabbing against Brian’s stomach. Brian was too, his erection trapped in his jeans but definitely noticeable, and John shifted _just right_. He noticed.

“And this time? When it’s real?” Brian plucked open the buttons of John’s waistcoat, dividing his attention between his handiwork and John’s face.

He saw it when John made up his mind, when he settled on the thing to say. His lust-clouded eyes cleared, though the lust remained. His lips—God those lips—came together into a confident smirk. “No, I’m not going to fuck you,” John said.

Brian’s jaw dropped. He could have slid between the couch cushions and hidden there like lost change.

John kissed the center of Brian’s forehead, then his nose, and his lips. “But I will make love to you, if you’ll permit me,” he whispered, sucking Brian’s bottom lip into his mouth, nipping it.

“Hell yes, John.” Brian shoved the waistcoat off of John’s shoulders, tossed it onto the couch, and tugged clumsily on John’s neckcloth. “Okay, you’ll have to take that off yourself,” Brian said, pouting. “I don’t have a clue how to untie that, and it’s cramping my style.”

John made quick work of the offending garment with deft fingers and added it to the growing pile of his clothes. His hand slid into Brian's hair, his mouth on his again. Brian got his hands under John's shirt, all that remained between him and Brian's eyes, skimmed the taut muscles of John's back and shoulders. John groaned. "People still have beds in 1967, yes?"

Brian shook his head. "Nope." He kissed a line over John's jaw and down his neck, sucking hard on the flesh of his shoulder, which made John hiss. "People take pills now so they don't have to sleep."

"What?" John squawked. "You're not serious."

Brian laughed. "Not even a little. Ow!" John had tugged on Brian's hair and bit into the bend of his throat. Not hard, but it was surprising.

“You are an arse, _Mr. Revere_. Whatever that even means.”

“I really am. Stick around and I’ll explain it to you. And you’re a biter.” Brian’s face was beginning to hurt from smiling and laughing, but he couldn’t help it. Everything about John filled him with such joy that he couldn’t contain it. He’d probably cracked too, and for now that was fine with Brian.

John tugged Brian’s shirt off over his head and tossed it to the floor. “Christ,” he breathed, staring down at Brian’s bare chest and stomach, brushing his fingertips along his sides with a reverent grace. “I need to see the rest of you, laid out beneath me.”

Brian sank his teeth into his lower lip, feeling an unexpected sensation of self-consciousness to be faced with such frank appraisal.

“No need to be embarrassed, my dear,” John said, kissing both of his cheeks. “Though you do turn a most becoming shade of red, did you know that? Oh, and look how far it goes.” He peppered Brian’s burning skin with kisses, over his throat, across his clavicle and mouthing over the bone there.

“Well now you are making fun of me.”

John sucked Brian’s pouting lower lip into his mouth and released it with a pop. “Take me to your bed,” he whispered, half request, half command.

“God, the way you say that.” A shiver went through Brian and he nodded. John stood up, offering him a hand. Brian let John pull him to his feet, glancing at the pile of really outdated clothes and shook his head, laughing. Lenny was going to come home to a confusing mess.

Brian dragged John by the hand to his bedroom, locking the door behind them.

The smooth wood of the door was cold on Brian’s back as John pinned him there and crashed their mouths together in a flurry of want. John sank to his knees at Brian’s feet, pausing and blinking with that fantastic furrowed brow at the fly of Brian’s jeans. He looked back up at Brian, hair a wild mess around his beautiful face, cast in rosy shadow from the light of the pink lava lamp on the desk. “I haven’t the faintest idea how to unfasten that. How did you phrase it? It’s ‘cramping my style?’”

Brian popped open the button and slid down the zipper slowly, dragging out the decadent sound as long as the contraption would allow. “Easy peasy.”

John hooked his fingers under the waistband of Brian’s jeans and plain briefs, dragging them down his legs, letting Brian step out of them. “Dear God in heaven,” he gasped, his eyes roving Brian’s body from bottom to top and back down again. “The dreams were faulty after all.”

“What do you mean?”

“You’re even more magnificent than I envisioned.” John planted an open-mouthed kiss on Brian’s thigh, scraping his teeth over his flesh, making his way to Brian’s cock. “May I use my mouth on you?” His hands were warm on Brian’s legs, a lovely contrast to the cold door against his back.

“God, yes.”

The effect was immediate. John’s hot mouth was on him, taking Brian’s entire cock at once, his tongue caressing the underside. Eyes drifting closed, John let out a wrecked kind of moan that sent spectacular vibrations through Brian’s dick which was more or less halfway down John’s throat.

“Holy fucking hell,” Brian gasped, his head falling back against the door with a thump. He grabbed a handful of John’s hair, looking down to meet his gaze. John’s movements were fluid and confident and exactly perfect. Everything Brian liked, nothing he didn’t, and a few new tricks that Brian couldn’t figure out how he’d lived without until now. “How—John, damn—how do you just _know_?”

John’s fingers dug into the back of Brian’s thigh and he hummed, stroking his own cock with his free hand. The collar of his shirt was open and disheveled, the vision of it all unadulterated perfection.

Everything was happening so fast, warm pleasure pooling in Brian’s belly. “I’m close, John.” He was panting, gasping for breath. John’s fist closed hard around the base of Brian’s cock and he pulled away, leaving Brian feeling keyed up and cold. He whined in protest.

John stood and pinned Brian to the door with his hips, strong arms bracketing his narrow frame. “I want you to finish on my prick.” The words were a command but John’s eyes held a question. His lips were pink and swollen, hair a lovely disaster.

“What a coincidence. Me too. Gimme this?” Brian asked, tugging at the hem of John’s shirt. John allowed him to pull his shirt up and off. Between the pink glow of the lava lamp and the hazy amber from the streetlights outside his window, Brian took his first good look at John’s body. He found well-formed muscles that cast tantalizing shadows over his arms and chest, a smatter of silvery scars glimmering in startling contrast. “Okay, that uniform does nothing for you. Oh my God, you’re a total beefcake.”

John laughed, that adorable, confused expression on his face again. “I haven’t the slightest idea what that means, but it’s good?”

Brian ran his hands over John’s newly exposed skin in a reverent caress. “It means you’re a bona fide hunk.” Another of those hard kisses that came from both of them at once, more desperate than before, bringing their bare skin together in a tight line of gloriously electric contact. John steered them toward the bed and shoved Brian backwards onto it, his lips spreading in a surprised grin when Brian bounced, a metallic squeal echoing through the room. “Inner-springs,” Brian said, illustrating with a little hop on his ass. “Very bouncy.”

“Oh, I like this.” John settled himself between Brian’s legs, mouthing at his inner thigh, scraping with his teeth, biting his way up. “And I like the sounds you make,” he said and licked the underside of Brian’s cock with his flat tongue.

“Mm, John,” he whined. Then John’s tongue was warm and wet and insistent on his entrance and Brian gasped. John hummed in approval, his breath tickling the little hairs on Brian’s backside. Grey’s tongue had Brian panting, his cock twitching and leaking and desperate. “ _John,_ oh God—” John cut him off with two of his fingers in Brian’s mouth, one expressive eyebrow raised in expectation. Brian closed his lips around John’s fingers and suckled, working up as much saliva as he could with his tongue, letting it press and flutter against John’s digits.

Grey groaned, his eyes closing in bliss until he took his fingers back. Turning to sink his teeth into Brian’s thigh, he slid one finger into him. John worked him open with his fingers, his mouth, his words, his other hand that never seemed to leave Brian’s body. It was sparks and naked flame everywhere John touched him.

“Christ, Brian.” John’s voice wavered, his breath ragged with what looked like a great effort to take his time, to drag it out and make it last. “You can’t possibly know what it is to have the same dream over and over again, for years. To believe it to be impossible, nothing but stubborn fancy, cosmic cruelty.” He pulled his fingers out of Brian and rose up on his knees, dragging Brian roughly against him, hooking his legs over his hips in a move that took Brian’s breath away. “And _then_ to discover it _is_ real and it _is_ possible.” John caressed his legs, bent low over him, so close their lips brushed. “And it is exquisite.”

It didn’t matter how much he kissed John, Brian thought, it would always feel like the first and the millionth time all at once. He fumbled with one hand onto his nightstand, found the nondescript wooden box there, managed to get it open enough to fish out a little tube and a condom.

At his movement, John pulled back, eyeing the crinkling wrapper as Brian tore it open. “What is—?”

Brian shushed him with his index finger pressed firmly against John’s lips. “So what I’m hearing,” he said, wrapping his hand around John’s cock, fisting it and reveling in the decadent noises that fell out of John’s mouth. He rolled the condom into place. “Is a dream is a wish your heart makes.”

“Yes, precisely,” John said as Brian applied a squirt of lubricant to him. “That’s a lovely way to phrase it.”

“Oh man, if you liked _Cinderella_ , wait till you see _Mary Poppins_.”

“You were correct, the oddities do abound with you.” John dropped kisses along Brian’s jaw and throat and licked his clavicle.

Brian splayed his fingers against John’s back, loving the feel of the muscles there, the strength and power, all for him. “Would you prefer normal?”

John shook his head. “Not at all. Nothing whatsoever about our meeting could be considered normal.” He was tender and cautious as he pushed inside, eyes fixed to Brian’s, somehow knowing exactly when to move and how. Brian’s body accepted John so easily, stretching for him, filled by him.

It was completion when John started to thrust in and out, the planets aligning and the heavens opening up and all that sappy stuff that Brian hadn’t put any stock into before. “ _John_ . God, oh _God_ , how? How is it this perfect? Please tell me it’s not just me.”

“It isn’t just you,” John gasped and slid one hand between them to grip Brian’s cock, pumping his hand with an experienced fluidity that had Brian seeing stars. “Don’t hold back, darling. I can feel you. Let go, I’ll catch you.”

Brian’s orgasm barreled into him, through him, out of him, his entire body going tight and electric and then pliable again as he spilled between them. “ _John,_ yes, oh God yes!” he cried, dragging his nails down Grey’s back.

“Yes, that’s it. Christ, Brian!” John held Brian close, kissed all the air out of him until they were both panting and gasping, sweaty foreheads touching. They were both still now, save for the occasional little tremors in their legs. “I should have woken up already,” John said, breathless with wonder.

“I know the feeling,” Brian murmured.

John pulled out and they both made sounds of disappointment. Brian took the condom off of him and dropped it into the wastebasket by the bed, scooting over so John could lie down beside him. They wrapped their arms around each other, Brian’s head resting on John’s chest. “Can I keep you?” Brian whispered into the quiet room, the scent of sex all around them.

There was a long pause and John sighed. “I don’t know. I haven’t a clue how I actually got here or how to get back. Or if I can.” There was no hint of theatrics, only a statement of fact about his predicament. Every last thing that John had said or done had been completely sincere. It wasn’t logical or rational, but Brian believed him. Believed that someone or something had catapulted John two hundred years into the future, into Brian’s life. The how and why didn’t matter, all that mattered was that it had happened.

But the thought that John would leave, would vanish back to wherever or whenever he came from, filled Brian with dread and despair. Absolutely nothing had made a lick of sense since he’d ordered that coffee at Sugar Shack. But there was a feeling of consummate rightness in this, in them. “For the night then?”

“Is that safe?”

“Yeah, my roommate knows I like men. It’ll be fine.” Brian yawned, feeling the drowsy tug of satiation and sleep. But they were sticky and needed a shower. Brian groaned and climbed off the bed. “Come on, let’s get cleaned up and then get some sleep. You’ve apparently had a long trip.”

John let out a breathy kind of chuckle. “You could say that, yes.”

Brian glanced back at John, saw the patch of red staining the gauze dressing on his thigh. “Uh oh, you’re bleeding again.”

“Hmm?” John looked down at the bandage, wincing as he put weight on that leg. “So I am.”

“That cut must be deeper than I thought.” Brian listened at the door, but the apartment was silent on the other side. He unlocked the door and opened it, taking John’s hand and yanking until they collided as if drawn by a gooey magnet. Brian grinned against John’s lips. “Aww darn, I just realized that I missed a golden opportunity.”

“What was that?”

“I should’ve said ‘The British are coming’ instead of your name.” Brian laughed, feeling very pleased with himself.

John gave him one of those sweet smiles that was both fond and confused. He brushed at a stray lock of Brian’s unruly red hair. “You are so very strange. And yet, I’m spellbound, if you’ll pardon the expression.”

Brian kissed him, drowsy but no less thorough. “Let’s get a shower and then I’ll take you to Mom. She’s a doctor. She’ll stitch you up if you need it. Oh!” Brian’s face split into a wide grin. “If you think the springy bed is cool, wait until you see indoor plumbing.”


End file.
